Pakistan appears to be building a new nuclear reactor to produce weapons-grade plutonium at Khushab in Punjab province, an American watchdog group has said citing satellite imagery.
Satellite images taken on June 3 indicates that Pakistan appears to be building a third plutonium production reactor at the Khushab nuclear site, 160 kms southwest of Islamabad. Pakisthan’s second heavy water reactor, which it began building between 2000 and 2002, is still under construction, Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) said.
“The third reactor appears to be a replica of the second heavy water reactor and is located a few hundred metres to the north, though construction is progressing much more quickly than the second,” former UN inspector David Albright and Paul Brannan wrote in a report.
The ISIS said it has reported on January 18 the resumption of construction of what appears to be a plutonium separation facility at Chashma, some 80 kms west of Khushab.
“The expanded construction at Khushab, and apparent resumption of activity at the Chashma plutonium separation plant, all occurring within the last six years, imply that Pakistan government has made a decision to increase significantly its production of plutonium for nuclear weapons,” said the ISIS report. The report said Pakistan may have decided to produce more plutonium for lighter warheads for cruise missiles, or to upgrade weapons aimed at Indian cities.
“Pakistan may have concluded that it needs the plutonium to improve the quality of its nuclear arsenal and build a new generation of lighter, more powerful weapons,” said the report.
“Plutonium-based weapons can have more explosive yield in smaller, lighter packages than weapons based on highly enriched uranium, which is currently Pakistan’s principal nuclear explosive material,” said the ISIS report.
Pakistan may want warheads small enough to fit on cruise missiles it is currently developing, the report said. “It also may want larger yield (50-100 kiloton) fission weapons that can cause far more damage to Indian cities than its current relatively low-yield weapons,” warned the report.
According to the report, “Plutonium-based fission weapons would enable Pakistan to build deliverable thermonuclear weapons. Although these weapons would enable Pakistan to build a nuclear arsenal more threatening to India, their development would in fact create greater instability in the region and eventually less security for Pakistan.”
It also claimed that the recent activity at Khushab and Chashma should be viewed as a sign of “an accelerated nuclear arms race between India and Pakistan.”
The American group said the Chasma facility is likely to be related to the construction of the two additional reactors at Khushab. When the reactors come on line, Pakistan’s demand for reprocessing capacity would increase significantly.
“The first Khushab reactor went critical in 1998 and looks significantly different from the second and third reactors...The facilities at this site are not safeguarded by the IAEA and support Pakistan’s nuclear weapons programme,” said the ISIS report.